The Return Of Riddick

In Hollywood the sweetest thing to whisper in the money men's ears this year is the word 'sequel'. British cinemas are chockablock with franchise offerings this summer, and by the sound of it, the passion for the cinematic dead cert isn't going to go away. This morning we have news that Pitch Black director David Twohy has signed up to direct up to three more outings of Vin Diesel's character Richard B. Riddick. Twohy, who wasn't expected to direct the sequels, has explained his new-found enthusisam thus; 'I pitched an ambitious treatment for a sequel two years ago and [the studio] passed,' Twohy told Variety. 'It was only after Lord of the Rings and the new Star Wars that the possibilities here grabbed us. Once we started running with it, everybody fell in love with what we were doing, even the studio. Is everybody planning for three? Yes, they are.' Although Batman scribe Akiva Goldsman and X-Men writer David Hayter both had a go at a script for the sequels, it seems that Universal are going with Twohy's original plan for the series - another reason why he may have signed up. 'We'll give Riddick multiple adversaries on different levels,' Hayter says of the sequels. 'We think of Pitch Black like Mad Max was to Road Warrior, or The Hobbit was to Lord of the Rings. They were places to find one of your characters, enabling you to take them to different places in subsequent films.'